


till I should rise

by bookoftheazuresky



Series: star followed star [3]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Assassination Attempt(s), Canon-Typical Violence, Implied/Referenced Dubious Consent, M/M, Not you Prowl, Somebody help these seekers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-21 14:45:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17045648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookoftheazuresky/pseuds/bookoftheazuresky
Summary: A routine port visit leads to an assassination attempt on Sunstorm and Skywarp; Prowl updates his plans.





	1. Chapter 1

Thundercracker waved Sunstorm off when the younger seeker made as if to pick up some of the Air Force resupply datawork spread across the table. “It’s fine, I can handle it on my own.”

Despite this, Sunstorm managed to acquire one of the datapads by dint of his superior speed. “There is no reason why you need to when I’m here,” he told the elder seeker. Thundercracker, expression amused, simply lifted it from his grip before he even had a chance to turn it on.

“If you’re dying for something to do, why don’t you try keeping Skywarp out of trouble while we’re docked? It’s much harder than getting this pile in order.” The blue seeker gestured toward the cluttered surface, then pushed Sunstorm towards the door by a wing. “Don’t let him get overcharged, don’t let him pick fights, and for Primus’ sake, don’t let him pick up anything he might use for pranks.”

“Er.” By the end of the list, Thundercracker sounded rightly exasperated with the potential for minor disaster. But now that Thundercracker mentioned it, that did sound more difficult than ordering resupply lists.

“I’m not going to punish you if you can’t manage it. Primus knows St- _I_ can’t all the time,” Thundercracker swiftly corrected himself. He continued, more subdued, “Just keep him company and try to keep him from doing something irredeemably stupid.”

Sunstorm dipped head and wings in affirmation, choosing not to comment on the slip of the glossa. Just another day with a bereaved trine. “Yes, sir.

When he was at the door, Thundercracker suggested, “And maybe you could try having a little fun yourself?” The elder seeker’s deep voice was kind. “I worry about you, you know.”

“I…do know,” Sunstorm said, because he needed to say something. Sunstorm was very conscious of the way Thundercracker hovered, like Sunstorm was a step away from making an awful mistake if Thundercracker took his optics off him. Having lost a wingmate for that reason, it was only natural that Thundercracker would worry about being saddled with an inexperienced MTO. Before things could get too awkward, he continued, “I will try to keep Skywarp from getting banned from the station.”

“Good luck with that. Now,” Thundercracker made a shooing gesture and went back to his datapads.

~

“No.”

“Awww, c’mon, it would be hilarious.” Skywarp looked just this side of rapturous at the contemplated vision. “Foam _everywhere_.”

“And then you would have to clean it all up.” Sunstorm didn’t really get the point of Skywarp’s pranks, particularly when Skywarp was the first one to get interrogated when they happened. Unless his victim had recently made a public enemy of someone else, though that was rare. “And be lectured.”

Skywarp waved that consideration off. “That doesn’t stop it from being funny!” He set down the bottle and picked up the next one to read the label. “Besides, you can totally use these for other stuff. Like…cleaning! Cleaning your plating. Much better than plain solvent.”

“If you say so.” Sunstorm looked around the store again, trading skeptical looks with the mechanoid proprietor. The port the ship was currently docked with was theoretically neutral territory, but most of the galactic community knew that Cybertronians had been locked in a brutal civil war for the past three million odd years. They were therefore understandably wary of two heavily armed and armored Decepticons.

“Besides, Brakecut totally deserves to have his paint ruined.” Skywarp picked up a container of translucent crystals. Sunstorm transferred his skeptical gaze to them. He had no idea what they were for, since this shop sold cleaning and metal care supplies. Skywarp had a very practical amateur’s grasp of chemistry, however, so he still didn’t trust anything the dark seeker seemed interested in. “He’s an aft.”

Brakecut was, if Sunstorm recalled correctly, the mech that had last gone to the brig with Skywarp for fighting off duty. Thundercracker hadn’t been able to get more out of Skywarp than a scowl and some opinions on Brakecut’s competency and character, at least in Sunstorm’s hearing. Something in the way Thundercracker seemed to let it go suggested that Skywarp had been more forthcoming without any listening audials. “And it’s worth taking more punishment duty to tell him so.”

Skywarp appeared to consider this. “Well, I could always teleport him outside the ship while we’re underway.”

“I was thinking more along the lines of ignoring him,” Sunstorm said, slightly appalled, though he had the suspicion that he was being teased. The cant of Skywarp’s wings suggested humor, not malice. “Or perhaps deleting all of his datapads while he is in recharge. Something that is _not_ immediately traceable to you. Which teleporting him into space definitely qualifies for.” It was also quite dangerous for a minor prank, though seekers were moderately space capable. Sunstorm wondered again what Brakecut had done to warrant this, even as a joke. Admittedly, he had been fairly nasty to Sunstorm as well, but Skywarp seemed to take it personally.

Skywarp gave him an arrested look. “That’s a good idea!” He set down the crystals with a decisive air. Sunstorm’s relief was tempered by Skywarp’s obvious enthusiasm at the suggestion. “See, this is why it’s a good idea to talk about it with other people.”

Somehow, Sunstorm thought that this wasn’t what Thundercracker meant when he’d said ‘keeping out of trouble.’

~

Not buying pranking supplies apparently meant that Skywarp had more money to spend on engex. Or so Sunstorm gathered from the enthusiasm which Skywarp hauled him down the corridors of the port, cheerfully ignoring the potential collisions with the pedestrians in the halls. Fortunately, most of them gave two Decepticons a wide berth. Sunstorm internally despaired of making sure that Skywarp didn’t get overcharged, which would likely lead to the energetic seeker getting in _more_ trouble via his teleportation, or just by running into the wrong person. Cybertronians were tolerated at _best_ in most of the galactic community. Especially by organic species.

Sunstorm wondered once again if Skywarp’s flighty personality was the reason why he had developed teleportation as an outlier ability. It was the perfect counterpoint for someone who flitted from thought to thought as Skywarp did, an essential part of his nature that was reflected even in his light, stunt-filled flight. There seemed to be a connection, tenuous and elusive but undeniably present, between the nature of a spark and the ability exhibited. Of course, if it was true, then there was always the question of what part of his spark Sunstorm’s own ability reflected.

They stopped at a courtyard junction of three different corridors for Skywarp to survey the bar choices offered around the edges of the large space. There was a handful that had symbols indicating they sold energon products. Most were not busy, since the station’s internal time was early in the on-shift. “Now, which of these am I banned from?” the black seeker wondered aloud, eyeing the signs.

“If the answer is ‘all of them’ do we get to go back to the ship?” Sunstorm asked, faintly hopeful. Skywarp was still overlapping their wings companionably, which was nice, but he was dreading going into the sticky, unwashed, full-of-lowlifes establishments the port had to offer. His experiments with mixing engex and his outlier ability had been…interesting thus far, though as a jet he had a high tolerance for energy-dense fuel. He did not really want to conduct any further attempts in public.

“You’re so cute,” Skywarp said teasingly. Then Sunstorm felt him abruptly tense, a fraction of a second before a laser bolt punched through the white plating of Sunstorm’s wing.

A scream caught in Sunstorm’s vocalizer as Skywarp used the grip on his arm to teleport them across the junction, taking cover from a hail of gunfire in the far hallway branching off. Both Decepticons cycled up their integrated weaponry as energon dripped on the floor.

Sunstorm bit back a curse at another scorch on his wing; two mechanoids down the otherwise empty hallway, blasters already firing. He pinged Skywarp the information as he flung his palm up, calling up a curtain of plasma and superheated air and pushing out. Short to midrange combat, usually a seeker’s bane, was not really a problem for Sunstorm- if that didn’t kill them, it would certainly blind them and leave them reeling.

Skywarp pinged him back with an order to stay where he was and control this chokepoint, and then the dark seeker disappeared again.

Shivering with reaction to the pain in his wing, Sunstorm scanned to make sure he’d offlined his opponents. He updated Skywarp with the confirmed kills, no other enemies in sight. Aside from the attackers, this back corridor was deserted; good, as it was now streaked with carbon scoring and molten metal, only some of it from the walls. The smell of burnt internal fluids filled the scorching air.

After a moment, Skywarp confirmed two kills and one prisoner, and ordered him back. Sunstorm skated back around the corner on his antigravs, not wanting to jar his injured wing.

Mechanoids and organics were peering out of the storefronts, but the junction was clear of anyone besides Skywarp, the corpse of a mechanoid of the same type as the two Sunstorm had killed, a grayed-out Cybertronian, and the limp and bleeding mech in Skywarp’s grasp, also Cybertronian, though badgeless. The elder seeker had ripped off one of his lanky arms, the one with the integrated gun. It was lying in a glowing puddle a respectable distance from the tableau.

“I called for cleanup,” Skywarp said, with the predatory calm he only displayed in the midst of danger. “Once they get here, it’s medbay for you.”

Sunstorm’s damage reports told him he had a nicked fuel line in his wing, so he agreed. It only took about a breem before Interceptor and his squad appeared at a run down the corridor Skywarp and Sunstorm had originally entered by. The same corridor that these mechs had used to follow them, Sunstorm had little doubt.

Skywarp handed off the energon-stained mech, then turned back to Sunstorm, shaking glowing liquid off of his claws.

“Yeah, I kinda have to touch you, so if you’d turn down the lightshow,” Skywarp said, optics alert and moving over the surroundings.

“Oh. Sorry.” He hadn’t even noticed. Sunstorm made an effort to calm his racing spark, and his plating returned to its usual non-luminous state. Skywarp grabbed his wrist and they were gone.


	2. Chapter 2

Prowl grimaced as the coded report came in. A failure. How disappointing.

Getaway, at least, had managed to make good on his name. The bounty hunters he had hired wouldn’t have any information of value- Getaway was too good of an agent for them to know anything incriminating beyond the identity of their primary target. The Spec Ops agent had even managed to recover the funds that he’d used to pay them. So while this was a setback, it was not a major one.

Getaway _had_ managed to come away with more information on Sunstorm’s outlier ability and relationship with Skywarp. An update to his Spec Ops profile was in order. Unfortunately, the agent reported, he’d had to leave the station to avoid the influx of station and Decepticon security, so no more information would be forthcoming.

Prowl sent his agent the code to return and report in person. From the Decepticon ship’s projected path, there would be no more opportunities for a second attempt. Unfortunate, but not uncommon when tracking members of the Decepticon Air Force. Especially with the current disarray of the branch- Megatron had placed most of the responsibilities of the executive officer with Soundwave, but had not promoted anyone to the rank of Air Commander. Unsurprisingly, most of the regional Air Force commanders were unhappy with this, not least because they were now obliged to defer to their regional fleet commanders.

It did make things tedious for the Autobot tactical division, because there was no longer a unifying hand on the Air Force. However, the confusion and overall fearful atmosphere amongst the Decepticon High Command was to the benefit of the Autobots. If, to maintain it, Prowl needed to have all the apparent successors deactivated, he would do so. By whatever means necessary.

~

Megatron’s summons to speak with him once the ship reached its destination was no surprise, especially with the reports that had been sent ahead notifying of the cause of the short delay at the port station. The possessive hand that wrapped around his waist when he appeared before the Decepticon leader was likewise unsurprising.

However, Sunstorm found his claws digging into his palms. His outlier ability flickered under his plating erratically. Distracted by reining it in, he flinched when Megatron cupped his face.

“Oh? Still a little nervous?” Megatron asked.

Sunstorm seized on the excuse. What was wrong with him? “It was a surprise,” he said neutrally.

“You did well for a first assassination attempt,” Megatron congratulated, rubbing a thumb over Sunstorm’s lips. “An occupational hazard that you will have to get used to.”

“Yes, my lord,” Sunstorm said by rote. Then, daringly, he asked, “My lord, who…?”

“Soundwave’s preliminary findings indicate bounty hunters hired by a potential Autobot agent. Routine, as these things go.” Megatron gripped his chin and made Sunstorm meet his optics. Sunstorm kept his face as calm as possible; difficult when his spark stuttered uncomfortably in his chassis. His frame wanted to push away; of late he had come to feel that there was something essentially different, and not altogether pleasant, between the way his trine and Megatron touched him. “Which is why you should always be alert. Autobot Spec Ops doesn’t scruple, my dear.”

“Yes, my lord,” Sunstorm repeated. He made himself go pliant as Megatron drew him closer.


End file.
